Daughter lives in a western Cleveland, Ohio suburb, It's non competitive, 1/4 mile East across the county line. in the other county, and all kinds of competition. :( I am semi rural, use the Telephone DSL, they have a message, including attachments of 200M, a real bummer. We also have Directv. Cable from Time Warner is available, but don't care for the TV available. Cable internet is expensive if not bundled with TV. M.L. wrote: > On Wed, Sep 23, 2009 at 12:01 PM, Sean Breheny wrote: > >> How likely is this to be a problem? I don't know. It would seem that >> competition could prevent this - as long as you regulated agreements >> between ISPs. There are probably also much more subtle aspects like >> search engine results. >> >> Sean >> > > Yes, competition would fix it if most people had access to alternate > services that were equivalent in features. > In most places there is no real competition. If you are rural enough > not to get cable TV your option is probably DSL from the phone > company. They charge line fees so that competitors cannot compete on > price. Cable companies have similar deals. My area (Brookline, MA) is > of an extremely rare type in the US because I have three options - > municipal wifi, cable, and DSL. The DSL is slow, the cable is > expensive, and the WiFi is spotty. We should be able to get FIOS soon. > (expensive too) > > If you have monopolies I don't see how it is fair, prudent, or > intelligent to not have government regulation. > > -- > Martin K. > -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist